If you have managed to source a turkey that is free-range and locally produced this Christmas, you will no doubt want to make the most of every last morsel. Make your bird go further by reinventing leftovers into delicious meals that can span several days. It not only saves costs, but it's also good for you.

1. The bones

Bones form the basis of fine-quality, nutrient-dense stock – a great source of gelatine and minerals and the staple requirement for homemade soups, stews and risottos.

Making stock

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Collect the bones from your roast turkey. Add the turkey neck, feet and wingtips if you have them, then place all of them in a cooking pot, add ¼ cup vinegar and cover with cold water.

You can also add fresh vegetables (carrots, celery, parsnip, onions or leeks) and herbs (thyme, rosemary, borage or nettle) for extra flavour and added nutrition.

Bring the contents of the cooking pot to the boil, and then reduce to a gentle simmer. Turkey stock needs a minimum of 1 hour to cook, but it can be cooked for up to 6-12 hours to extract the maximum nutrients from the bones.

When finished, drain the solids from the cooking pot and discard. The liquid can be stored in the fridge or freezer.

Leftover meat from your roast bird needs to be pulled off the carcass and refrigerated as soon as possible. It's worth separating it into white meat – which can be used for sandwiches and salads – and red meat – which is excellent for pies and stews.

Sauté 1 finely chopped leek in a large frypan with 2 tsp butter until lightly browned. Add 300g Arborio rice and 125mL white wine and allow the wine to absorb for 3-5 minutes. Add 500ml turkey stock – a little bit at a time so that the rice does not go gluggy. You may not need all the stock. Cook until the rice is clear but still firm. Stir through 1 tbsp mascarpone cheese, the green vegetables and 1 cup shredded turkey meat. Season to taste. Pour onto serving plates and garnish with fresh mint, parsley and borage leaves.

Turkey Salad in a jar (for the Boxing Day fishing trip)

In a 1-litre, wide-mouth glass jar place a handful of snow peas followed by six cherry tomatoes then scatter ½ cup shredded leftover turkey meat. Follow with a layer of thinly sliced carrot. Toss together a salad of lettuce leaves, balsamic vinegar, cold-pressed sunflower oil and olive oil. Add this to the jar then drizzle a little extra salad dressing down the edges before sealing with a lid.

3. The extra bits

The extra bits – the giblets, feet, neck and head – should never be thrown out: they are extremely nutritious and full of turkey-goodness.

Quick and easy techniques for cooking gizzards, heart, liver and feet

If your bird comes with a gizzard (the stomach), once cooked, try chopping it up finely, then blending it with your gravy for additional flavour. Liver can be gently fried with onions and brandy, and then pureed with butter to make a pate. The heart can be simmered with butter and herbs, and then tossed with breadcrumbs. The neck and feet should be added to the stockpot!

Save the fat

Turkeys are one of the leanest breeds of poultry so there usually isn't a lot of fat available to render. However, if you buy your bird directly from a farmer, or find one that is free-range with all the bits (particularly the neck, back and tail) intact, you might be in luck.

The birds that contain the best quantity of fat, with the healthiest fatty acid profile, are those that have led a life close to what nature intended – with a diverse range of food in their diet and plentiful access to pastures where they are able to roam free.

Fat can be rendered from the cooking juices after roasting, or from the skin on the back, neck and tail before cooking. To render: cut off the areas of fat with some poultry shears, chop into small pieces and place in a small saucepan with roughly 1/3 cup water to every 500g fat. Place in a pan over a low heat and let it melt gently for 2-4 hours. When the skin turns a yellowy colour, strain off the fat through a cheesecloth into sterilised glass jars and repeat the process by adding more water. The rendered fat will keep in the refrigerator for up to three months.

11 comments so far

"If you have managed to source a turkey that is free-range"Free-range?

You know what that means, don't you? No, you don't.

All you know is it makes you feel better in your ignorance.

Turkeys might not be pretty animals, but they are quite aware, and they are just as interested in their own comfort as you are.

Turkey farmers are in business, it's not love. They are in the business of growing these animals as quickly and as cheaply as possible. You will know when you pay for your living conditions: less money spent, less comfort.

In the case of turkey farmers, they are not supervised nor regulated for animal welfare, only for health.

Yes, "free range" might make some difference, reducing abject craven torture and cruelty, to just abject torture and cruelty.

You don't need to eat the flesh of animals, ever. Your life expectancy will increase if you start eating a healthy plant-based diet instead. So there is no justification for what you advocate be done to these turkeys nor to any animals for the sake of palate: there can be no worse case of gluttony than torturing and killing others for momentary pleasures of the tastebuds.

I bet there are many things in your life that you don't need to do as well. Most certainly one is coming onto the SMH website and making inflamatory comments about people who eat meat.

How about showing some tolerance.

Commenter

Griffo

Location

Sydney

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 2:11PM

Hi Scott from Broome.

Radical.

To NOT be cruel to animals?

To not cause them a life of discomfort and bloody end.

Your argument reduces the whole life of an animal to be less important than you spending 20 minutes filling your gob with it and probably getting yourself high cholesterol, obese and potentially cancer as a result.

Out of genuine kindness to animals, join the other fast growing number of "radicals" including Bill Clinton, Ellen Degeneris, Mike Tyson and even Leonardo da Vinci and turn to a healthier plant based diet. Remember too that you can neither be an environmentalist nor an animal lover if you eat animal based products. Not possible. Do your research.

Commenter

truth sayer

Location

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 2:01PM

Do you know that the mining needed to extract the minerals to produce the components to build the computer that you wrote the above comments on have displaced the natural habitats of thousands of animals? In fact, the air you are breathing is stealing valuable nutrients for plants and animals globally.

I love animals more than anyone else, and the above article actually respects animals massively. Whilst everyone else is eating processed foods and throwing away left overs, the article encourages readers to make the most of the animals that have sacrificed their lives for our sustenance. That is true respect of animals and something all great chefs support. Your idiotic vegetarian arguments are misguided.

Commenter

zecc

Location

SOUTHBANK

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 2:13PM

Thank you Zecc for being so balanced about the article. This article is promoting tip to tail eating, which is far more sustainable and ecologically friendly than the disposable consumer culture that has been so pervasive for so many years. If truth sayer (an odd choice of name as it is an opinion you are expressing, not necessarily a truth), had bothered to read the article with an open mind, perhaps they would have seen that it is a step in the direction of sustainability and informed eating. Perhaps in the spirit of the festive season a little less trolling and a little more kindness?

Commenter

melb_girl

Location

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 3:01PM

A point very well made. Also worth noting is the fact that growing crops to support a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle also kills animals. It does so by modifying habitat, if not by the direct elimination of pests. Vast numbers of animals die in fact, from bacteria to earthworms to insects to mammals.

As well, by raising animals for food we protect them. Cattle, pigs, chickens and even turkeys would not live in such numbers nor have so much land given over to them if not for the value they have as food. In a vegan world all of these, and wildlife too, would be reduced to the status of pests, competing with us for food. In order to replace the protein they represent they'd have to be pushed off the arable land, so that it could be cropped. Grazing land would have to be brought under the plough, and the grazing animals pushed to the margins. Many would be condemned to starvation, predation, or a bullet..

Commenter

Dan

Location

Date and time

December 27, 2012, 5:24PM

While I agree with some of truth sayer's principles, I do not agree with the holier than thou approach. I personally do not react well to being confronted and abused by born-again fundamentalists of any kind - those who express their opinions as though they are facts and assume those who do not share their views are either stupid or evil.

Commenter

Craigvague

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 4:30PM

A good, short, and timely article! I keep seeing articles these days explaining how to make things from scratch, such as stock, and I think it's great. It's generally healthier and cheaper to make these things at home, and once you learn how, it doesn't take long. Anyway, keeps you out of the pub!

Commenter

Veekz

Location

Date and time

December 26, 2012, 7:55PM

I'm an animal lover and I also grew up on a small dairy farm with cows, chooks, ducks and the occasional pig. The vegan brigade et al can tie themselves up into knots over this subject, but the simple fact is that millions of animals are currently being bred for human consumption. And that is not going to end anytime soon. The turkey that truthsayer was so vigorously defending wouldn't even exist if somebody didn't want to eat it. The best that realistic animal lovers (as opposed to the permanently outraged) can do as far as farm animals are concerned is to advocate for free range, low scale, ethical farm management at every opportunity.